4.

0 Introduction
This chapter presents the findings and discussion for this project. It started with the responses
of the interview with the respondents. After that, the transcription of the responses is analysed
and presented in the following sections.

4.1 Responses of Interview

For this project, five managers from tour operators and two managers of government agencies
that were related to Sabah tourism activities were chosen for this project. The details of the
respondents were shown in Table 4.1 below:
Respondents Name of Agency/ Tour Operators
Tour Operators
TO1 Amazing Borneo Tours & Events
TO2 Exotic Borneo
TO3 Capac Travel Service
TO4 River Junkier Tour
TO5 Archangel Borneo Holidays
Government Agencies
GA1 Sabah Tourism Board
GA2 Tourism Malaysia

Table 4.1 List of Respondents

From Table 4.1, the interview were stop at TO5 as the data were saturated at TO5. This
means, the responses of TO5 were “no new information or themes were observed in the data”
(Guest, Bunce, & Johnson, 2006). As for government agencies, only this two government
agencies were identified in Sabah that helps in promoting Sabah’s tourism activities. As this
study solely focus on Sabah, the students did not reach out to other government agencies that
available in Malaysia.
4.1.1 Business Resilience
When this questions were asked to the respondents, majority of their responses were “to be
able to stay in business for a long period of time”. Their understanding of business resilience
is surprisingly equate. One of the respondents quoted that
“for me, when I can continue and operate in this business for long period of time is what
resilience means…it also means that no matter what happen, especially during this Covid-19,
I still can stay in the business”. (TO3)
Overall, business resilience reflected by majority of the respondents is to stay in business
even though they cannot fully operate or partially operate.
4.1.2 Suggestions for Tour Operators
Majority of the respondents suggested that in order for them to stay in business during this
pandemic, they need to cut cost. One way to cut cost would be minimizing their staff. Due to
this minimization, lots of employees from tourism and hotel sectors were asked to take
unpaid leave or dismiss as well. This situation is unavoidable even though it seems difficult.
Another noteworthy responses from there respondents were, government through financial
institutions should extend or decrease their loan repayment plan. As their business is not
good, there is no fix income. The business as well barely survive as they depends on domestic
tourists, which does not help much.
The respondents also described that, marketing plan and activities during this pandemic
should be change as well.
“We can attract local people to come visit our places by reinventing the marketing
plan….cut prices, add more packages for example….tour operator also can do co-operation
with other tour business to run their business…by doing this, they can help each other
survive as well as at least stay in the business until this pandemic is over”. (GA2)
Another noteworthy responses by the respondents were using technology to promote their
places. This is a good time for tour operators to promote their places as most people stay at
home and did not engage with any activities.
“We can use online platform that is available to promote our places….use Zoom, Facebook
Live or other medium that can shows our places here….I believed, after this MCO is over,
they sure remembered and eager to visit our places” (TA2)

4.1.3 Method of Convincing Visitors

To convince the visitors to visit places of tour operators, they described that enhancing
marketing and promotions activities will help to gain the confident among the tourist to visit
their places. One of the way that tour operators and government agencies can do is using
social media to promote their places. Social media played an important role in marketing
activities.

“What I do to convince back the tourists is, I’ll post at least once a day an update of what
happening at my place…I can show to them that I always sanitized public area as
recommended by KKM….I also post on my FB page that we have mySejahtera apps & hand
sanitizer were provided” (TA4)

The respondents also mentioned that government play a very big role as well in encouraging
and convincing the people to visit back their places during or after this outbreak.
“I think that government should do more in promoting our places….it’s not enough just us
doing the marketing….they can offered tax reductions, lower air fare even starting the Visit
Malaysia campaign back which focusing more on locals” (TO3)
4.1.4 Effect of Covid-19
In regard to the effect of Covid-19 towards the tourism industry in Malaysia, most of the
respondents were affected by the restriction of travelling as well as the closing of the
international border. During the first phase of Movement Control Order (MCO) imposed by
government in Malaysia date 18th March to 31st March 2020, the total lost from room booking
in hotel industry were estimated around RM570 million.
“When the government announced MCO, most of my visitors cancelled their bookings…I
already make the necessary preparation for them to stay at my lodge but because of the
MCO, I have to revamp everything” (TO1)
“In Kota Kinabalu alone, most of the tourists from China cancel their flights and hotel
bookings…this actions affect the hotel owner so much….some of the famous restaurant for
tourist also has close….the hotels were barely survive. It affect us so much as our main
industry here in Sabah is tourism” (GA1)
“I was upset…there’s a group of tourist from Korea already make their booking want to stay
at my lodge here….then, they have to cancel because of the MCO…I lost around 10K
because of that cancellations” (TO2)
“From what I observed, most of the staff working in hotel as well as tour operations, they
were either given unpaid leave or cut-off…quite sad actually to think about this situation”
(GA2)
“People lost their job, domestic violence increase….for some people, MCO is good but not
all

4.1.5 Role of Government

In helping tourism industry to recover, government play an important role. With Covid-19
cases still reported daily, it is impossible for the tour operators as well as hotel to be fully
operated. As such, there is a few things that government can do to help the people, especially
the tour operators to stay in business.

“I really hope that the moratorium can be extend until year…looking at the current situation,
there is no way that the international tourist will be allowed to come to our country…
because of this, we don’t have any income….barely survive, so I do hope the moratorium is
extended at least until next year” (TO5)

“What government can do to help tourism industry is by encouraging locals to visit and stay
at respective hotels, resorts and restaurant….no choice…if we want to depends on
international tourist, I don’t think they can come to our country yet….encourage more tax
reduction for air flights, promote local places, foods that we don’t really know…showcase of
places of attraction…I believed Sabah is quite unique as we have all the elements of
tourism…like my agencies, we always encourage tour operator to actively promote their
places on Facebook or IG....that’s the very least we can do to help them” (GA1)

“It’s hard to convince people to travel again after what happened…some of them were
stigmatized by society…..to curb this problem, I think what government can do is giving the
right information to people…nowadays, news spread fast with the advancement of
technology & Internet…so, it’s not possible to inform the public through Facebook, Twitter
and other media social platform that can be used” (TO3)

4.2 Discussions and Findings

This study were conducted to fulfil three objectives. The discussions and the findings of this
study is presented on the following sections.

4.2.1 To study the impact of Covid-19 to tourism sector, especially to tour business
operators

The impact of Covid-19 is undeniably harsh, especially to tourism industry in Sabah. Table
4.2 present the impact of Covid-19 from the responses of respondents.
Table 4.3 Impact of Covid-19
Impact Responses/ Respondents
Loss job “Many employees lost their job…with no tourists to come, how can
they operate?” (GA2)
Restriction of “One of the procedure imposed by government is restriction on
travel interstate travel…because of this, people were having difficulties to go
visit and support the local tourism” (TO1)
Economic ”Many lost their job, the global oil price is dropping…..this means, the
downturn economic is not good….it affect our export as well” (GA1)

From Table 4.3, it can postulated that the impact of Covid-19 on tourism industry in Sabah is
job retrenchment, restriction of travel by government and economic downturn. It is not a
surprise for this to happen. Globally, the country that depends on tourism product were badly
affected by this pandemic. One of example that having the same problems with Sabah would
be Thailand. More than 540, 000 workers in this industry were laid-off by their employer.
Some hotels were also closed down. Same goes for entertainment venue which were force to
temporarily close for visitors.
As a results of this pandemic, unemployed rate also increase rapidly. Many people cannot go
to work as it is one of the measures taken by government to combat this pandemic. Due to
this, those who were daily paid cannot go to work. Some even loss their job. According to a
report from CEDAW, domestic violence cases happened more frequently during the MCO as
the level of tension due to loss of job and over compressed in the house.

4.2.2 To understand the future of tourism trend after Covid-19 pandemic

Post covid-19 in tourism can be unpredictable. There is no guarantee that international
tourists can enter Sabah as of now. International tourists play an important role for Sabah
tourism industry. They are the main market for most of the tour operators. There is some
predictions that can be observed. The trend are presented in Table 4.4.
Table 4.4 Future and Trend of Tourism after Covid-19
Trend Responses/ Respondents
Precaution “When this pandemic is over, most of the tour operators will be very
measures careful in operating their businesses….they’ll look into hygiene and
cleanliness of their place more often…this is as precaution measure so
that when the outbreak happen, they still can operate” (GA2)

“Cleanliness is a must now…we can’t simply operate if we don’t

sanitize our premise” (TO3)
New norm “New norm, people travel using mask….washing their hand frequently
is a must now” (TO1)
Digitalization “Traveller now want to go for ‘touchless’ experience….people feel
comfortable with going online rather than present physically there”
(TO4)
Teamwork “In order for the businesses to survive, they cannot stand alone…tour
operator have to work together with hotels, even with their competitor
as well…you can’t survive if you do this alone” (GA1)

It can be summarized that post covid-19 trend would be different than before. Tourists take
more precaution measures when they travel. They do not simply engaged with any tour
operators who do not practice hygiene at their places. Apart from that, there is a new norm as
well. It is advisable to use mask when going outside apart from washing their hands
frequently.
Digitalization is a new things. It is safer to have digital experience rather than physically
being there. Of course the experience would be different but for their own good, the tourists
have to adapt to this. Tour operators also need to work together with other businesses as
well. Having a joint package is a good way to sustain in the business. Helping each other in
term of marketing and promotion activities.
4.2.3 To suggest measures that can be taken by tour operators to stay in the business after
Covid-19
A few measure can be done in order for the tour operator stay in the business. The measures
are presented in Table 4.5.
Table 4.5 Measures for Tour Operators
Suggestions Responses/ Respondents
Teamwork “I need to work together with other tour operators…I can’t survive
if I do this alone”(TO3)
Promoting domestic “Government can encourage locals to travel and stay inside the
tourism country….do more of promotion activities that encourages people
to go out….price reduction, sales; this kind of things can attract
people” (GA1)
Sustainability “Business operators need to think for measures that can lead to
sustainability in their businesses….they can’t expect us to help
them all the time….what they can do is practice recycle,
responsible tourism as well as good practice of tourism ethics”
(GA2)
Working “Tour operators like me need to re-evaluate my workplace
environment environment….how do I do my business, my relationship with my
employees as well as among the employee….I need to know so that
I can well prepared if something like this happen again” (TO5)

The measures can be summarized as follow; teamwork among the tour operators, promote
domestics tourism, practice sustainability and provide convenience working environment for
the employees. These are some of practical measures that can be done by the tour operators to
stay in business.